Quotes About Compassion

Agitation due to circumstances occurs when because of an external incident, you follow a thought, and your mind becomes agitated and scatters into a disturbing emotion. When that happens, keep the attitude of "There is no need to do anything!" Train in loving kindness and compassion, disenchantment, means and knowledge, and devotion. Following that, persevere in the practice as at the time of the view. That will clear it.

When your body is in seclusion your mind will be also. Give up idle gossip and speak less. If you hurt another's feelings, both of you create negative karma […] don't allow yourself to feel attached or hostile. Maintain a peaceful frame of mind. Give up angry and harsh words; instead speak with a smiling face.

May all sentient beings be endowed with happiness! May they all be separated from suffering and its causes! May they be endowed with joy, free from suffering! May they abide in equanimity, free from attachment or aversion

The guru said: If you want to genuinely practice the Dharma, do what is virtuous, even the most minute deed. Renounce what is evil, even the tiniest deed. The largest ocean is made from drops of water; even Mount Sumeru and the four continents are made of tiny atoms. (p. 30)

There is no difference between buddhas and sentient beings other than their scope of mind. What is called mind, consciousness, or awareness, is of a single identity. The mind of a sentient being is limited. The mind of a buddha is all-pervasive. So develop a scope of mind that is like the sky, which has no limit to the east, west, north, or south.

When you hear pleasant or unpleasant words, understand them to be an empty resounding, like an echo. When you encounter severe misfortune and misery, understand it to be a temporary occurrence, a deluded experience. Recognize that the innate nature is never apart from you... (p. 29)

Don't regard any sentient being as your enemy: to do so is only your mind's delusion. (p. 29)

A friend is the only person you will let into the house when you are Turning Out Drawers.

Helpful Reminders for Fathers and Other Birth Companions

Driving a cab is not really a nurturing type of relationship. You take people and they tip you, they may not tip you, you don't know their names, they don't care about you, you don't care about them.

We're all in this together. And every time we judge or think anything less than charitable about anyone, we crucify ourselves. We inflict self-pain.

I want to thank every single one of you for choosing to dance instead of fight, for choosing to love instead of judge, for choosing to open your heart instead of running away from what is now truly possible.

We call such a limited number of relationships love in our lives, but there is always love around us—it's as ubiquitous as oxygen.

Several times in my life, I've sat with women, friends of mine, who reveal, sometimes shyly, sometimes proudly, bruises of one kind or another, and I know I've said, "If it happens one time, leave him," I've said, "It doesn't matter how much you love him. Leave him if it happens one time." And I've said it with utter confidence, as if I knew what the hell I was talking about, as if violence was something that could be easily defined.

We are all dying, and because of us, so is the earth. That's the most terrible, the most painful in my entire repertoire of self-torturing thoughts. But it isn't dead yet and neither are we. Are we going to drop the earth off at the vet, say goodbye at the door, and leave her to die in the hands of strangers? We can decide, even now, not to turn our backs on her in her illness. We can still decide not to let her die alone.

Guenevere brought me a cookie and a big box of Kleenex. She said that choices can't be good or bad. There is only the event and the lessons learned from it.

When you do something nice for somebody, it is just like walking around a temple. It is just like saying a prayer.

Why are we so hard on one another? I wonder. Hadn't the world already given us challenges enough?

Never assume that you know the mind of another.

I'm so sorry. I love you. I never could have hurt you.

You love the people they were before, before all the awfulness that made them do this thing.

You know, when you were little and you got hurt or scared, I could make it all better with a hug or treat. But when your children get older, it becomes less and less easy to heal their wounds.

You love the people they were before, below all the awfulness that made them do this thing, you know?

His kind of courage was boundless, though, and he would not have turned away a person in need, whether a star performer or a simple laborer or a child such as Theo with no skills at all. It was not about the circus or family connections, but human decency. Herr